JUDGMENT

VENKATACHALIAH, J.:— By this petition for grant of Special Leave under Article 136 of the Constitution, coming up after notice to the State of Gujarat, the applicant seeks leave to appeal to this Court from the judgment of the High Court of Gujarat in Criminal Appeal No. 1097 of 1980 restoring the conviction and sentence passed by the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Valsad, against the petitioner in criminal case of 48 of 1979 for an offence under the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954. (Act for short).

Special leave is granted and the appeal is taken up for final hearing, heard and disposed of by this judgment.

2. Appellant was charged before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Valsad, by the Food Inspector, Navsari Municipality, with the offence of selling "Kesari coloured sweet supari sali" alleged to have been adulterated with "Yellow basic coal-tar dye". The learned Magistrate found the appellant guilty of the offence and imposed a sentence of an years simple imprisonment and a fine of Rs. 2000 both of which were the statutorily compulsory minimum sentences under Section 16(1)(A)(i) of the Act.

Learned Sessions Judge, Valsad, by his judgment, dated 14-3-1980, in Criminal Appeal 32 of 1979 preferred by the appellant, however, set aside the conviction and sentence and acquitted the appellant of the charge.

On further appeal by the State against the said acquittal, the High Court of Gujarat allowed the States appeal and, in reversal of the judgment of acquittal of the learned Sessions Judge, restored the conviction an sentence passed by the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate.

3. Appellant is a tradesman carrying on business within the limits of Navsari Municipality. On 7-12-1978, respondent No. 2, the food inspector of Navsari Municipality, purchased from the appellant 600 gms. of "kesari coloured sweet supari sali" and after complying with the procedural formalities packed and sealed the "supari" into three separate packages of 200 gms. each and one of them was sent to the Public Analyst who by his report dated 20-12-1978 (Ext. 12) affirmed that the sample contained a "yellow basic coal-tar dye" and that it did not conform to the standard laid down under the Rules. On 19-1-1979, the Food Inspector with the prior sanction of the District Health Officer, Valsad, (Exh .14), filed a complaint in the Court of the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Valsad. The prosecution culminated, as aforesaid, in the conviction and sentence imposed by the learned Chief Judicial Magistrate, and later restored by the High Court. Appellant now seeks to assail the legality of the conviction.

4. We have heard Sri V. B. Ganatra learned counsel for the appellant and Sri Girish Chandra and Sri M. V. Goswami learned counsel for Respondents 1 and 2, respectively. Though a number of grounds are taken in the memorandum of the petition for special leave, however, at the hearing Sri Ganatra confined his submission only to one aspect of the matter which, if accepted as correct, would go to the root of the case for the prosecution. Apparently, this contention in the form in which it is presented here was not placed before the High Court as we find no reference to it in the judgment.

Appellants learned counsel contended that "Supari" or "Betel-nut" is basically and essentially an yield of the Areca-Palm and must, therefore, be held to fall under "Fruit-products"within the meaning of Rule 29(f) of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Rules, 1955, (Rules for short) and, accordingly, the use of permitted coal-tar food-colours in it is not prohibited by law. It was further urged that the Public Analyst had not held that the "Yellow basic coal-tar dye", found in the sample, was not one of those food colours prohibited under Rule 28 and that, therefore, its use in "supari" which was a "Fruit-product" cannot be said to be prohibited. Alternatively, Sri Ganatra contended that the "supari" in this case was a "flavouring agent" within the meaning of Rule 29(m) in which case also